1881 United States Senate special elections in New York information
1881 United States Senate elections in New York
← Class I (1881) ←Class III (1879)
May 31—July 22, 1881
Class I (1887) → Class III (1885) →
Nominee
Warner Miller Class I
Elbridge Lapham Class III
Party
Republican
Republican
U.S. Senators before election
Thomas C. Platt (Class I) Roscoe Conkling (Class III)
Republican
Elected U.S. Senators
Warner Miller (Class I) Elbridge Lapham (Class III)
Republican
The 1881 United States Senate special elections in New York was held from May 31 to July 22 by the New York State Legislature to elect two U.S. senators (Class 1 and Class 3) to represent New York in the United States Senate, following the joint resignations of Roscoe Conkling and Thomas C. Platt.
Conkling and Platt resigned during an ongoing dispute over federal patronage privileges in the state with President James A. Garfield, particularly the lucrative office of Collector of the Port of New York. Their resignations were intended to trigger the re-election of each Senator to affirm their support in the New York Legislature as a show of either popularity or political force. Instead, the legislature demurred for 52 days before electing Warner Miller and Elbridge Lapham. During the election, Garfield was shot by Charles Guiteau, a Conkling supporter and office-seeker angered over his failure to receive a federal appointment; Garfield died two months after balloting concluded.
On July 1, Platt withdrew after 41 inconclusive joint ballots. On July 2, Garfield was shot by Guiteau, who declared his support for Conkling's Stalwart faction immediately after the shooting. With no consensus candidate emerging for either seat, a Republican caucus met on July 8 to nominate replacement candidates and settled on Warner Miller and Elbridge Lapham after Depew withdrew. Two weeks later, Warner Miller was elected to Platt's seat. Conkling's supporters held out for another week before acquiescing to the unanimous nomination of Lapham on July 22, ending the election.
President Garfield died on September 19. With the Stalwart faction effectively eliminated by Conkling's removal from office, Congress passed the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, which was signed into law by Chester A. Arthur, a former Conkling protégé.
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